THe THeA TR.e Off Broadway I N the opening scene of Ntozake Shange's "Spell #7," at the Public, the mercurial Larry Marshall re- fers to "the miracle we always pray for." Coming after her "For Colored Girls. .." and "A Photograph," the play shows Miss Shange's passion and wit and fiery talent to be unbanked, and even replenished, as transmitted by her remarkable director, Oz Scott, and a fine company. It can be con- sidered a kind of miracle, at that. At the openIng, Mr. Marshall-top hat and cane-comes out and announces himself to be a magician, the son of a magician who gave up the profession when a friend of his demanded to be made white on the spot. He is short- ly followed by members of the cast in Al J olson-blackface masks, singing and shuffling to their own accompaniment of cymbals, harmonica, and wash- board-an old joke but funny all the same. Off with the masks. We are in a bar where actors hang out and discuss casting and auditions and being turned down for parts, and other dubious de- hghts of the trade-especially being black In the trade. As the evening pro- gresses, they play scenes together, and dance and sing together, and then, one by one, withdraw into other character- izations-into monologues and dia- logues of fantasies and dreams and reminiscences. The invaluable Mary Alice first appears as a Brooklyn house- wife-falsetto-voiced, a nice woman bound for Manhattan and a good time-with the invaluable Reyno as a sympathetic cabdriver who takes her to the bar. Laurie Carlos is a young wom- an who brushes and brushes her hair while she does her housework or stands in line for unemployment compensa- tion, brushing all her fantasies out-of a house with the little girl from the Castro Convertible commercial, of lav- ender hair on a blue satin pillow. In a harrowing recitation, La Tanya Rich- ardson plays a low and crazy woman who wants a baby ("Never a family, never a man-a baby boy who would wet and cry and suckle and sleep") and manages to have one. Mary Alice, again, is an intellectual young woman, with a copy of Nietzsche tucked under her arm, on a bus bound for Princeton, who comes to realize that the compli- 73 ment "Oh, baby, you're so pretty," de- livered by an undergraduate (Reyno), just won't do anymore. The play is seemingly loosely con- structed, yet it is held together by the dyndmic presence of Mr. Marshall, who function,; as a kind of compere throughout, and by a dramatic tension that builds to a powerful climax in a monologue in which Mary A1ice, with all her considerable dramatic resource-, fulness, becomes Shange herself, pour- ing al] Shange's humor, her orIginality, her depth of feeling, her astonishing imagery in to the thoughts ahou trace and other matters which fill the mind of a little hlack girl growing into a poet. Ellis Williams is fine as the bartender (among other characterizations), and so is A very Brooks as a young actor (among other characterizations). Dy- ane Harvey and Beth Shorter do well, too, in smaller roles. The dances, by Dianne McIntyre, and the music- jazz and blues-written by Butch Morris and David Murray, in every way enhance the glowing words. Good setting, costumes, and lighting by Rob- ert Yodice, Grace Williams, and Victor En Y u Tan, respectively. At one point, Mr. Marshal] does refer to Spell #7, but I've forgotten the context; the title is the only thing about the show that could be improved. -EDITH OLIVER . . - '1\); 'ù "--... ...*, --- ......\.,,,.. .ri\....., - . J I ( ( , flY R. .. f" J. ß ..,............; ..... - ."'... ii^". it . 'It , 1'.. ...,..,"'#' ." " · :; ..,;-"; ': , , : ' \ . ' :1 ." . 1 ''''......1...;.,.,0'. ... ....J OJ, ., . , ./ , 41- Jl" t' ,.-1 oJ ,'- (',0/" ,4 ,I ,t pi /'1.. "II r-- \I?_ ..... ",,",þ ...:?,t .... t...,/..... 21f"L1-R